Assam, Tripura kick off balloting with high turnout, While Tripura on Monday witnessed 85 per cent polling in one Lok Sabha seat, in Assam 76 per cent voters cast their ballot in five constituencies as the first phase of the nine-stage general elections ended peacefully

Guwahati/Agartala/New Delhi: India went to the polls on Monday, with nearly six million people casting their vote in five constituencies in Assam and one of two seats in Tripura. The chief ministers of both the northeastern states dismissed any "Modi wave" and expressed happiness at the high voter turnout of at least 76 percent in Assam and as high as 85 percent in Tripura.

The nine-phase Lok Sabha election, the world's largest democratic exercise involving 814 million eligible voters spread across 28 states and seven union territories, began Monday and ends May 12. The results will be out May 16.

Brisk polling was seen in five of the 14 Lok Sabha constituencies in Congress-ruled Assam and one of the two in Marxist-ruled Tripura. Voting for only these six seats, out of a total 543 in the country, was held Monday.

An estimated 6.4 million people were eligible to vote for the five seats in Assam.

In Assam, polling was peaceful even as the day coincided with the 'Raising Day' of insurgent outfit United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA).

As balloting began at 7 a.m., people queued up at polling stations in Tezpur, Jorhat, Kaliabor, Dibrugarh and Lakhimpur. Polling was briefly delayed in a few of the 8,588 booths due to technical snags in the electronic voting machines (EVMs).

The political fate of 51 candidates were sealed in the EVMs in Assam's first phase of polling. Three constituencies will go to the polls April 12 and the remaining six April 24.

In Tripura, over 80 percent of the 1.2 million electorate cast their votes till 5 p.m. in Tripura West constituency, as polling was held for one of the two seats in the Left-ruled state, an official said.

"Long queues of people were seen in most of the 1,605 polling stations. Clear sky with excellent weather encouraged voters to come to the polling booths early," Tripura Chief Electoral Officer Ashutosh Jindal told IANS.

Voting was delayed for a while in some polling booths due to technical snags in the EVMs but engineers either replaced or rectified the machines, he said.

Jindal said no major complaint of wrongdoing was received from any party.

Polling in the tribal reserved Tripura East constituency will be held April 12.